Episode 1458 (3 June 1997)
Synopsis Martin is now trying to avoid the gang, and he sneaks off early to school, but they're waiting for him outside his house, and warn him he'd better be there at 8pm tonight. As they pass the Vic, they spray paint their sign on the wall and Grant catches Martin. He protests that he didn't do it but Grant gives him an earful, until Ruth comes over to rescue him. Grant says he needs telling, and Ruth says he shouldn't be so harsh to a child. Grant says she won't really know about them until she's had kids of her own, and Nigel saw Martin and the gang vandalising the community centre last week too. Ruth goes off with the broody sulky look she gets when anyone else discusses babies. Lorraine calls the Vic and pretends she's ill. Peggy takes the call and doesn't hand it to Grant. He tries to call Lorraine but Joe says she's out. Peggy says pointedly that's funny, she said she was ill when she phoned. Lorraine goes to the café and Bianca asks about Joe, saying that they can sit elsewhere, as she was sitting with the traders and Barry chatting and joking. As they sit down, Barry tells the punchline of a psycho joke, and Lorraine incredibly rudely interrupts their conversation and pokes her nose in, neurotically telling Barry that it's not funny. Dot gets a letter from the council offering her a council flat, and Nigel offers to take her to see it. It's in a dishevelled block of flats with gangs of youths vandalising cars outside. When she goes inside they discover several faults which need to be repaired by the council, damp, etc, and as they are leaving the neighbour says she has been waiting 4 weeks for the council to repair her ceiling which has half fallen in after a flood from upstairs. She also says the previous owner died in there and the body was there for 2 weeks before anyone found it. Dot is horrified, and Nigel is sympathetic. Dot sees Ruth in the video shop, with Ben, and she says she can tell she'll make a good mother, and Mark as well - he once looked after a new-born child left on his doorstep, and was very good at it. Ruth once again goes off in a broody sulk. She chats to Gita about babies and Gita suggests fostering children, since obviously they are an unsuitable couple for adopting a baby, but there is a much greater demand for foster parents, and they could maybe get a child that way even though Mark is about to pop his clogs. Annie tells George that she needs a proper job and she's getting bored, and if he won't give her the club management, she will look around for another one. George says hastily that he has plenty of work for her, and she says "so when do I start?" Simon asks Lenny about having baths in their house, and they talk at cross purposes for a while as Simon thinks it's about flooding the bathroom. Lenny says he's lucky they didn't press charges and Simon is so incredulous that Lenny realises he doesn't know the real reason and says ask Tony what he did. Simon hassles Tony who says he didn't tell him because he knew he'd go on at him, but it's part of his job. Simon points out that breaking into other people's offices isn't really part of his job unless he's some sleazy hack, which Tony denies. Sarah goes to see Joe, and Joe says that he didn't think she'd want to know, and people seem scared of him now. He then spends ages explaining the layout of his bedroom furniture and accessories is so that they are precisely like they were in the mental hospital. Sarah says that when he's better maybe they can go out together, which cheers Joe up. Grant is still trying to phone Lorraine, and Peggy says that it's hard for her having to bring up a child on her own, after David walked out and left them: and it's a terrible thing to grow up without a father. Grant takes the point that he is doing exactly the same to his wife, and goes off sulkily. Grant realises that Peggy and Tiffany are ganging up on him, and tells Tiffany not to get her feet under the table, and has she asked Simon recently when the boiler will be fixed. Peggy also decides that they need a christening party, and asks Tiffany what she thinks. Tiffany is pleased and agrees, and Peggy says she will broach the subject with Grant. Grant catches Martin going past again and tells him that he has to repair the damage to the Vic where his gang spray painted it. He hands him a pot of paint, and says that if he carries on with the gang he will end up in prison, and isn't it odd that even though he says he didn't do it, he's always the one who gets caught. Martin says Mark has just given him the same speech, and he went to borstal and it didn't hurt him. Grant implies that this is not true, and says he was inside for 3 weeks when he hit a copper, and was locked up 23 hours a day, and afterwards his wife left him. He adds that Martin should know what prison did to his old man, and what would he think if Martin follows the same path? Martin says he's finished painting and runs off terrified. That evening, Martin hides in his bedroom when the gang come to call for him, and when they start shouting through the letter box, Mark goes to get rid of them. He then questions Martin about what they are doing, and why Martin is still hanging around with them. Martin tells them that they are planning to break into the community centre and steal the computers and petty cash. Ruth immediately phones the police, and Martin is horrified and runs off. The police catch the rest of the gang, and Ruth and Mark go to see if Martin went to tell them, but it seems he didn't and he's disappeared again. He's at the allotment, and he burns his gang jacket with the green symbol on it. Credits Main cast *James Alexandrou as Martin *Todd Carty as Mark *Caroline Paterson as Ruth *Wendy Richard as Pauline *June Brown as Dot *Paul Bradley as Nigel *Jacqueline Leonard as Lorraine *Paul Nicholls as Joe *Daniela Denby-Ashe as Sarah *Patsy Palmer as Bianca *Ross Kemp as Grant *Martine McCutheon as Tiffany *Barbara Windsor as Peggy *Paul Moriarty as George *Nadia Sawalha as Annie *Mark Homer as Tony *Andrew Lynford as Simon *Deepak Verma as Sanjay *Shobu Kapoor as Gita *Russell Floyd as Michael *Desune Coleman as Lenny *Shaun Williamson as Barry *Daniel Scott-Croxford as Craig *Ricky Lynn as Trevor *Flip Webster as Woman Category:Episode Category:1997 Episodes